


Sympathy for the Devil

by dulcebase



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Angst, Death Threats, F/M, Imprisonment, Tooth is a badass
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-06
Updated: 2013-01-06
Packaged: 2017-11-23 22:08:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/627032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dulcebase/pseuds/dulcebase
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Curiosity is a wicked thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sympathy for the Devil

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [ this prompt](http://rotg-kink.dreamwidth.org/1511.html?thread=204263#cmt204263) on the kinkmeme.

Even with the mere cages hanging empty in the air, they unnerve her. For they were why she descended.

She had not before been in the Nightmare Kingdom- and if she had, it would certainly not have been for this long. For the fortress stood carved out of the bowels of the earth, and she was a creature of the air, as Sister of Flight. All for the best, really. She was rarely out of her own kingdom, now, with this rush of belief. She simply had no time to leave Punjam Hy Loo. That was, until curiosity finally overtook her. Curiousity, and revenge.

So, talwar in hand, she descends.

Cages have always unnerved her. Always, since she was young, and now they hold only bitter memories.

The irony is not lost on her.

But she needed to see them, her wings fluttering in empty air as she reaches out, slender fingers running against cold metal. She shivers, then. Cold. Cold, she appreciates- the appreciates the touch of Winter. But it is Jack’s cold she loves, not this. This cold is dark and empty.

Soot and dark sand stain her hands as she pulls them from the coldness of the cage bars.

She almost misses the pod as she flits around, observing, looking; she almost glazes over the hardened cocoon of black among rocks, a mere sliver of sunlight shining onto the matte of its darkness. She almost passes it by without a second thought.

It is quiet. The Nightmares are out, spreading their fear and hate. Yet their master, it seems, remains.

Past the flickering globe- children grow every day, and others learn to believe, thus the globe is always, always shifting- she flies, and hovers over the outcropping where the chrysalis of darkness draws the light into its clutches.

It terrifies her. It intrigues her.

And it allures her most of all, a seductive whisper of curiosity that refuses to cease until she flits above it, observing it in greatest detail she can in such light.

It is an intricate thing.

The edges are rough and pointed, layer upon layer of sand shimmering beneath a coating of thick black matte, so only when the sun hits it a certain way does it shine. It conforms to fit a body, a lithe body, long and thin with endless tapering legs and broad shoulders that slope, each end of it narrowing to a point that anchors it into the stone. It becomes the darkness, absorbing the small slivers of light that enter from the cracks in the ceiling where the King once communicated with the Moon, long ago in the Dark Age. And in the crevices where layer meets black layer, the black takes a new quality, a shimmering, shining purple, a plethora of dark color, like magpie’s feathers.

It intrigues her, her mind racing with a million questions and a million theories all along with the incessant chatter of the MiniFaeries, and it’s almost unconscious as she runs a finger along a seam between two layers of ebony.

It is her gasp that is completely unconscious.

The sound is like the fleshy cracking of bones, accompanied by a sharp hiss and a gasp of breath as the cocoon opens. And she first notices the smell.

The smell, of smoke and musk, dark in their fragrance, like burnt charcoal in autumn, like sandalwood and copper.

In the crevice, there is the dreamweaver, and her eyes are drawn to him.

The entire length of his face is relaxed, an odd sight, his eyes closed- odder still- mouth agape just slightly as if breathing, and indeed he is, his breaths themselves shaky and uncertain. She tightens her grip on her talwar.

She could do it. She could end it. Forever.

And she considers it. She considers it quite seriously, mind racing with possible situations as she runs the dull edge of the blade against the Nightmare King’s throat.

She could end it, banish the Nightmare King- no, kill him while he slept under her. It’s a prospect that she, Queen of the Faerie Army, feared by her enemies and respected, loved, even, by all others, smiles at.

As she turns the blade under his chin, she feels that power.

She feels it until she feels instead the corpse-cold grip of the ashen hand on her wrist.

He pulls her in.

The cocoon opens under her, swallowing her as he forces her down, reforming as she’s pressed against the slender musculature of his form, the reverberating sound of skittering bugs and fleshy breaking ringing in her ears as the chrysalis closes above her, shutting out all light.

The only light is his eyes.

She can feel his smile as her eyes slowly adjust to the near-complete darkness, she can feel his dark chuckle vibrating her chest, she can smell the darkness of smoke sticking to his skin like a heavy cologne.

The chatter of the MiniFaeries has ceased completely.

Only when she realizes her hand is empty does she snap out of shock. Only then does she struggle.

His laugh is deep, echoing, loud, now, as her eyes have adjusted and his face slowly illuminates itself with cold, dim light, centering itself in his eyes, painting his skin so many shades of grey. One of her hands curls under his jawline, fingers squeezing sensitive glands. Yet he chokes out a laugh, a dark amusement shimmering in the eclipses of his eyes.

“Still, little bird,” he whispers, a rasp over panicked fluttering wings, as the chrysalis pulls in on itself, creating a space not just tight, but claustrophobic- “we would hate to clip your pretty little wings.”

One cannot say he doesn’t do his job well, she thinks, her struggle stilling. But her calmed body speaks nothing of her mind.

“Pitch,” she hisses, her grip tightening on the coolness of his flesh. “Let me go.”

But his hand is still curled around her wrist, she notes, gripping it loosely, but unmoving, his other hand pinned beneath her weight. Still, he smirks.

“And if I don’t?” he sneers, his fingers pressing into the inside of her wrist, causing her to lose her grip just long enough for him to speak. “What will you do? Slit my throat? Call up your little faeries to protect you? You are defenseless.” He raises her hand, then, the appendage still twitching with the pressure he applies to the tendons in her wrists, ripping feathers from their roots as he twists away from him. A chuckle, but that fades into utmost seriousness. “Defenseless and imprisoned. By me.” His smile breaks out once more, and she forces her own hand back down against his trachea, her other hand coming up to silence his monologue. She’s crouched above him, now, her knees digging into his unrobed abdomen, her back pressed hard against the roof of the chrysalis. He smiles under her palm, a low chuckle.

And he bites.

She squeals in pain, pulling her hand sharply from his face, her eyes darting to the wound at the junction of her palm and ring finger- the imprint of scraggy tooth and fang marring her skin.

“And who is this creature?” he whispers, accusing, “Who is this ruthless queen? Certainly not the same Tooth that flits about aimlessly, is it, little bird?” The laugh is short, slow, dying in his throat. “Do I just bring out the worst in you, your Highness?”

“Quiet,” she breathes, but the hand on her wrist forbids her from tightening her grip more than a loose hold.

“And what are you Queen of, exactly?” he taunts, “A few faeries and some teeth?”

“Silence!” She barks, her face contorted in fury. Her hand is joined by its twin, and she shifts the two, her one hand weak, but the thumb of the other pressing into the hollow of his throat.

“Oh, but don’t blame me, little songbird,” he rasps, “it was bound to come out eventually. How long did you think they would believe your façade?”

She freezes.

He smiles.

“How long do you think they would believe that quirky little Tooth was so cheerful? I know better. I always know.” His neck is craned, reaching up closer to hers, pushing himself closer, tighter in her grip, and she can smell his breath, the sickening sweetness of rot in its first stages. “You try to hide who you are, you try so desperately for acceptance and love and friendship, but what are you, really? Oh, you act so cheerful around them,” he hisses, “but under the hard mask of eccentricity you and I are no different, are we? You are just as dark as I.”

She does not respond.

“Is that not right? Toothiana.” Her name rolls off of his tongue like silk, and she flinches, put off by the sweetness in his voice. “Pretty little bird.”

“I do not fear you, Pitch. Not at all.” But her voice is breaking.

“But you fear bringing the Guardians down, don’t you?” His voice is cold against her cheeks. ““You fear it will be you who cannot save them, when it is you who has doomed them. Don’t you, Toothiana? You fear it will be you who brings them down. Just like you did with your parents."

It takes only that for her to collapse on him. Her hands are weak around his neck, her elbows digging into his shoulders as she sits on his abdomen, her head in defeat against his chest.

He does his job well.

“Let me out,” she manages weakly. 

He relishes her broken spirit. Yet that lasts only moments. For her command sinks deeply into his mind, pulling at a cord he wanted to forget. His mouth is open for long moments before he can bear to utter the words.

“I can’t.”

She looks up at him, weakly, with disbelief and betrayal.

“I can’t,” he repeats, louder, bitterer. “This is no sleeping pod. This is a coffin.” He spits out each word like venom, tightening his grip on her wrist not in malice, but in a twisted sort of comfort- for her or for himself she cannot say. “It can only be opened from the outside. By the Fearlings. Nightmares are fickle creatures, your Highness. They expect production after meticulous planning. And I failed to produce.” It is here that his voice takes a darker turn, but his eyes betray him, the whirling mix of silver and gold brimming with bitter wetness. “I could not prove my worthiness, and the Fearlings and Nightmares and Nightmare Men wish their King to be a fit and victorious leader. In their eyes, I am neither. And until they find a new vessel, they must keep their old one, but locked, so I may not taint their pride with my failure.”

They do nothing but stare at each other for several minutes. And in those minutes, he looks lost. Stuck in a purposeless existence, serving only as a host, a physical body the Nightmares used, waiting until they find one they like better.

Suddenly, she understands.

For she knows what it is to be helpless and caged. It is pity she feels, and empathy. For Pitch was, perhaps still is, wicked, yet no creature deserves what he is to suffer, the agonizing waiting, helpless.

And she will suffer with him, unless they are discovered.

They do not dare look at each other for a long time, each too frightened by the other’s shattered mask.

—x—

A week, and the children have begun to lose belief. The MiniFaeries try as hard as they can, but without their Queen, they are disheartened.

She curls against the former King’s chest as she slowly loses power.

And she weeps, for the loss of the children.

—x—

A month, and she cannot move.

They share a bond, now. They do not speak of it, in fact, they rarely speak.

“They should have come for me,” she whimpers against his chest, her hope gone.

“How could they have known where you were?” he hisses, a hand coming to stroke the feathers on her crown. “And if they did, how would they have reacted? To finding you with me?”

“They wouldn’t have cared,” she breathes. “They would have wanted what was best.”

She shudders, shaking off more molting feathers. The chrysalis is padded with them.

And he comforts, with a caress too gentle, with hands losing their pallor to a tanned sort of flesh.

“Oh, my pretty little songbird. Some things are best left forgotten.”

**Author's Note:**

> For those of you who aren't aware, a talwar is a type of Indian sabre.


End file.
